Vertically integrated cannabis businesses have a lot on their plates tight margins, shifting regulations, multi-state operations, and growing competition.
You can always develop new strains or push harder on production, but often, the biggest gains come from improving the fundamentals, especially inventory management. Simple, proven practices can help you avoid costly mistakes, run smoother ops, and unlock hidden revenue.
Here are three practices we see high-performing cannabis companies using right now.
1. Use Platforms That Integrate Directly With Your ERP
Most cannabis wholesalers rely on e-commerce platforms like Shopify, WooCommerce, or BigCommerce to sell online. These are great for getting started — but when your operation scales, they often can’t keep up.
Why? Because they don’t sync inventory data in real time with your ERP. This disconnect creates major gaps across departments. Inventory gets exported into spreadsheets, sales oversell, ops reorder is too late, compliance pulls bad data, and your team spends hours cleaning up preventable mistakes.
Instead, look for platforms that natively integrate with your ERP, automatically syncing inventory, orders, pricing, and fulfillment across systems. Everyone, from sales to warehouse staff to finance, gets the same live data, which means fewer errors, less rework, and better decisions at every level.
✅ Pro Tip: SellStack integrates directly with leading cannabis ERPs to provide real-time inventory visibility and audit-ready control, no more Excel.
2. Automate FIFO/FEFO to Avoid Waste and Maximize Freshness
Cannabis products have a shelf life, and yet, most wholesalers are still manually choosing which lots to sell next. That’s risky.
Using rules-based automation like FIFO (First In, First Out) or FEFO (First Expired, First Out) ensures that older or soon-to-expire products move first without needing a spreadsheet or guesswork.
These inventory methods are standard in industries like food, pharma, and retail for a reason: they reduce waste, improve product consistency, and increase compliance.
With tools like SellStack, you can apply FIFO/FEFO logic directly to your inventory flow, helping your team make faster decisions, avoid errors, and ensure your customers always get the freshest possible product.
⚡ Bonus: FEFO is especially useful for pre-rolls and flower SKUs, where smell, potency, and freshness drive customer experience.
3. Price Dynamically Based on Lot Attributes
Not all weed is created equal. Your team knows that, but is your pricing strategy reflecting it?
We’re seeing leading wholesalers boost revenue by automating price tiers based on lot-specific attributes like THC%, freshness, terpene profiles, or lots certifications. Rather than selling all units of a SKU at the same price, you can reward premium lots with premium pricing, and move lower-quality inventory faster with discounts.
Here’s a quick scenario:
You have 50 SKUs, each tied to multiple lots. That quickly balloons into hundreds of inventory lines to manage. Tracking all that manually? Not realistic. Automating pricing based on attributes at the lot level makes the process scalable and profitable.
💡 Bottom Line: This kind of pricing strategy isn’t just possible, it’s already driving measurable lift for cannabis wholesalers using modern inventory systems.
Final Thoughts: Better Inventory = Better Business
Inventory isn’t just about counting what you have. It’s the heartbeat of your cannabis operation, impacting everything from sales and finance to compliance and customer satisfaction.
The good news? These three practices, ERP integration, FIFO/FEFO logic, and attribute-based pricing, can be implemented with the right tools and just a few process changes.
Ready to modernize your inventory strategy?
SellStack helps cannabis wholesalers run smarter, leaner, and more profitably, without all the spreadsheets.
👉 Let’s talk about what’s possible.
